"The Open School" project is a series of meets that my friends and I organise across South-East Asia and Hong Kong. Anyone can attend these; there is no fee. The participants teach and learn skills and discuss a range of topics - travel, relationships, career, education and personal development. The meets are held at local libraries, cafes, co-working spaces, riversides etc. - any venue that we can beg, borrow or steal. We have no sponsors, and we do not require registration and never collect any personal information from the participants.

(Hong Kong - living with less, how to make a forest, travelling long-term)

There are no pre-selected speakers at an open school; all the participants are invited to join in and lead a session if they want to teach something or get answers on some topic. The discussion leader can decide to run the particular session in English or the local language.

(Singapore - learn to freedive, how to talk to strangers while travelling, adapting to a new country or culture)

How does someone post a topic?

When you come in, take a post-it and write down some skill or topic that you want to learn, teach or discuss. Stick this post-it on the designated board. Other participants will place stickers or leave tick marks on your topic if they like it.

Once your topic has 5 or 6 stickers, we will assign you a corner where you can run your session with the group interested in your question. We will have two or three discussions running at the same time. Feel free to move on to another discussion group if you like.

(Fake news and Readcamp in Phnom Penh)

Some topics that we discussed in the past.

(Singapore, how to make a great cup of coffee)

How to search better on Google? How to find trustworthy information online? How not to get scammed?

How to travel to another country with less than 30$? How to travel alone as a female traveller?

We believe that there is a lot of knowledge locked away in our cities and communities, but not many platforms for people from diverse backgrounds, ages, and occupations to come together and share. I was tired of rigid academic conferences or events where the organisers look at participants as an audience for some marketing initiative. We created the Open School as a neutral venue for people to come together and share skills, ideas and interests. There is a lot of talk of smart cities, and these tend to focus on technology, big data etc. The Open School community is of the opinion that a "smart" city is the one that is smarter by sharing.

Participants from Singapore and Phnom Penh join the "Art of Getting Lost" in Saigon. We are also encouraging people to move around and participate in Open Schools in other cities. In 2018, we will have Open School in Danang, Hanoi, Hai Phong and Jakarta in addition to the ones we have in Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar, Hong Kong and Singapore.

If you want to join the next Open School or organise one in your city, email me at smarterbysharing@gmail.com (I promise that I will never spam you).

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Mobile cafe, run by a student, outside a campus near the Turtle lake in Saigon. I asked her if her shop is part of some school project. She said that it is her own venture, she runs it when she has no classes.

Later on It turned out that this student was a friend of a friend. Small world indeed.

What is the Vietnamese word for 差不多？I was just commenting yesterday at old Asia hand post that some experiences in Vietnam remind me of time in China in the early 2000s. Today I walked into a neighbouring hairdresser to get a shave. The girl did not have a razor, but that did not dissuade her, she just unpacked a safety razor blade, and wedging the blade in her fingers, made my stubble disappear.

差不多 (chau bu duo) Is a Chinese phrase used to describe the process of just getting something done via a hack. A bit like jugaad in India.

In 2002, I was at the Indian consulate in Shanghai, renewing my passport, and I realized that I needed a clean shave for a new photo. I walked into a small saloon in the next building. The ladies there too, made short work of my facial hair with bare fingers and a blade. The girl later told me that I was the first customer who had walked in asking for a shave, and no one says no to an economic opportunity in China.